Speed-listening app is a Spritz for audio

Work & Lifestyle

Rightspeed is an app that gradually increases the speed of audio content to train the brain to listen faster.

It can sometimes feel like there isn’t enough time in the day to consume the sheer volume of interesting content available online. We have already seen Spritz help people read text at up to 600 words per minute by ‘streaming’ words in one spot, so that they don’t need to scan their eyes across the page. Now, Rightspeed offers to do the same for audio content, and help listener consume up to ten times as many podcasts and audiobooks.

To begin, users download the Rightspeed app for USD 2.99 onto their smartphone. Then they simply choose a piece of content and their desired playback speed, and enjoy the audio in half the time. Most interestingly, listeners can implement a training feature, which automatically increases the listening speed by 0.1x every two minutes, so that the brain barely notices the gradual increase.

As Techcrunch has pointed out, Rightspeed will need to partner with a content provider in order for the tool to be truly useful. Plus, much of the pleasure of podcasts and audiobooks is their well-paced, leisurely format, which listening to them at breakneck speeds would certainly undermine.

Perhaps Rightspeed could partner with an educational provider and be marketed as a revision tool?